Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1887-08-04

may arise spontaneously from purely
idiopathic causes: ''it belongs to the
morbid conditions in which hereditary
influence is strongly marked" DR..
Kempster says with reference to it: 'In
the vast majority of cases, INSANITY is
the last of a series of links, in many
instances chaning the individual to an
unsOund Inheritance. each successive
link being germ of disease acquired by
unW1se tampering with the laws of
health or by positive disregard of them
Unfortunately for humanity, however,
brain deterioration resulting from the
abuse of the brain in one generation.
does not die with the generation but is
handed down as a legacy, foul though it
IS, to be carried on, intensified perhaps
by the sane moral obliquities in the
child that generated it in the parent
No amount of penitential anguish can
efface from the tablets of a sin-scarred
brain the marks of broken and dis
ordered life The scar left by the
thunderbolt of intemperance, which
has lacerated the delicate brain struc-
lures, is not banished by few repent
ant signs. Nature never forgives sins
committed against her in the individual
and generation after generation scarcely
affords opportunity to get rid of the
Inheritance"
Alcoholism is mentioned in this
connection not only because of its great
evil effects but because the taste and
craving for alcohol is inherited and may
continue through several generations,
and for aught we know some are now
reaping the harvest of its use fifty wears
ago IN the form of nervous systems
inclined to disease: and if SO, what will
hE hn q
years hence?
Alcoholic intoxication and it's effects
have attracted much attention for
several years and are recognized as both
hereditary and transmissable; their
existence shows nothing but evil to each
victim, to his issue and to society. Dr.
5. Rogers, of New York, remarks: ut
is grave fact that the parent who
destroys the organizations of his nervous
system by alcoholic excuses is exceed
1ngly liable to transmit to his offspring
dlaordered nervous system which
manifests itself in most any form that
nervousness takes"
There are no more striking or melan-
choly examples of degenerate brain
organization transmitted to offspring
than those produced alcoholic excess.
Not one of the transmitted wrongs
physical or mental, is more certainly
passed on to those yet unborn than the
wrongs which are inflicted by alcohol
Many diseases engendered by it in the
parent are too often stamped in the child
while the propensity to its use descends
also, making the evil interest compound
in it's terrible totally.
DR.. S. g. Howe, in his statistics of
idiocy in Massachusetts, states 'Ethat
the habits of parents of hundred idiots
having been learned, one hundred and
forty, or nearly one-half were found
to be habitual drunkards In one
instance, in which both parents were
drunkards, seven idiOtic children were
born to them" He further states that
children of drunkards are deficient in
bodily and vital CLERGY, and are predis-
posed by their very organization to
have cravings for alcoholic stimulants.
If they pursue the course of their
fathers, which they have more tempta-
ton to follow and less power to avoid
than the children of the temperate.
they add to their hereditary weakness,
and increase the tendency to idiocy and
insanity in their constitution, 'and this
they leave to their children after them"
The constant action upon the animal
economy OF SO deleteriOus an agent as
bICOl1OI LII lStISC OIlctIIlIll0S CdIluOG DuU
produce very great and serious organic
changes which it is well known it does
produce in the stomach, the liver. the
brain and kidneys, in fact changing the
whole nature, physical and moral That
such condition in d parent should
lmpart to the offspring a predispOsitiOn
to like results IS In accordance with the
general law of transmitted tendencies.
Thus Tar most of what we have said
has been devoted to tracing from the
past the special influences and proclivi-
ties of morbid type which tend to
produce themselves by hereditary
transmission, including a few of the
many diseases affected there by and
which have been removed by direct
observation from the domain Of
hypothesis. But it is we'll to make use
of these studies to develop the future
from the facts thus gathered. Especial
attention should be directed to the idea
Of restraining a morbid tendency. If
instead of looking backward along the
line of defective decent of hereditary
traits we look forward to see how we
can avoid the transmission of such traits
or taints to succeeding generations the
results will be most practical as we'll as
gratifying.
Those Who study hygiene have found
that man has great power, not only to
control disease in his surroundings, but
has a direct control over himself to
prevent and modify diseased conditions.
The more he studies these subjects the
more important they become to him,
the more easily he understands the
various problems which he daily meets
in life, and the more he becomes con-
WINGED that man has greater control of
his health than was formerly thought
possible.
ct has been remarked that man
cannot escape the tyrrany of his organ
izatiOn." In part this is doubtless
correct, but it Will not do to accept it as
a whole. For, while faulty organization
will dominate the individual if left
unmatched, still by proper training and
education much may be done to ward
off or retard the progress of the down
ward tendency and elevate the tone of
the organization. 1t is better to be born
with a will power to resist disease than
to be treated by the most expert; but
far better than all to exercise that will
power in depressing noxious tendencies
and eliminating from the warp and
wool of mental growth" all that tends
to mar symmetry or disturb the proper
lions of T1apfpct